How can we best engage college students in the idea of learning instead of just getting a degree?

I work at a 4 year, public university and I see a great deal of students who come to school to get their degree (which they equate to money/success) and do not care about learning. What are your thoughts on the best way to engage them in the actual process of learning. I have my thoughts, but would love to hear my fellow TEDsters thoughts.

Mar 14 2013:
I spend almost 8 years in higher education. 4 years of those were about 'getting a degree' the other 4 about learning... The students' attitude has to do with the general attitude of society. The first time I went to college I wanted to become a teacher because I knew it would bring 'bread on the table' (also because I was a little inspired by other teachers). It was perhaps not the best choice I ever made but those 4 years allowed me to grow and understand myself better.
So after that, I felt I was stronge enough to go my own way and after a little detour in egyptology I ended up studying my greatest love: history. I studied it because I loved it, because I could learn from it.

The problem with most students nowadays is the fact that society dictates that you have to be succesfull in order to be accepted. And the only way to be that is to be a big earner. Society shows us that the only way to do that is by having a degree that will lead to a well payed job. If we want students 'to learn instead of to earn' we need to show them that chosing money over heart only leads to emptyness. They are blinded by society's story of success and consumption. If we want to engage students we'll need them to want to make the change themselves.

Modern society is not about making independently thinking, strong individuals of people but rather to make them productive citizens that do not question authority and unless we can change that we will not be able to engage students to learn rather than to earn.

Apr 4 2013:
Two thumbs up, Kim. I absolutely agree with this and I remember a quote I heard a long time ago that says "you can only lead a horse to water, but you cannot make it drink" and that's the biggest thing about education and school itself. As an undergrad student right now, I found exactly what it is I enjoy doing and that makes the learning portion of it so fulfilling. Whether or not my professor is enthusiastic does not really bother me because either way I WANT to learn and will therefore find ways to accommodate different teaching styles for the sake of learning. I see a lot of people around me who only want that piece of paper at the end of their 3 or 4 years, not picking up a single thing on the journey and that's just not the way to live! If you're going to be there a few years anyway, why not pick up a thing or two along the way, right?

Apr 10 2013:
Exactely!
In my field, history, it is mostly because of the love of learning. At my unirsety they started with almost 400 students in the department of history. Some of those do it because they want to be teachers but most of us, we just love history. The problem within our field , with the education, is that it doesn't leave much room for exploring. Everything is dogma. It kills our sense of renewal. If you try to step outside of the beaten track of scientific history your professors will put you down. In that way even the study of history has been corrupted by the wil of society. For example, all of our academic career we are told that historians can not judge, only analyze. This implies howevwe, that we are not allowed to learn from it either. I think this is wrong, we should be able to use history in daily life, learn from it so we do not make the same mistakes again.
This is why I did not cosider a academic career, I want to be able to see history through the eyes of a spiritual person. I want to be able to use my imagination, something that is a taboo in the science.

Mar 27 2013:
Today going to college is considered the "social norm". Students believe they have to go, even if they may not be "college material". Now I'm not saying everyone shouldn't try college, but if students are going to give college a shot , they need to stop thinking it is a prison. As a current college student, I see my fellow classmates just go through the motions of the college life. I feel students will learn more outside of the classroom. If a student was to get involved with clubs or organizations and go out to places like a homeless shelter or give a presentation on something they are passionate about, they will gain more knowledge and experience that the classroom can't teach.

Mar 17 2013:
By the idea of teaching. I think the teacher is the most important part of a course. As a student, I could see when the teacher was truly excited about the subject and it made me excited and interested. When the teacher was bored and just doing their job, it made learning strenuous and job-like. Teachers need to love what they are doing so they can do it well and with passion, it makes most students as passionate about the subject and enjoy going to that class.

Mar 19 2013:
A fine analysis of the problem. A good insight view is presented.
As a medical teacher I found the teaching , learning becomes successful & beneficial when the subject is taught with stories from clinical field and personal experience with passion.

Mar 30 2013:
I suspect few share my view. University and college is not about learning. It is a way station between childhood and adulthood, or a substitute for a right of passage, and is primarily viewed as a way to a better job and life. If you have a passion for learning, it matters little where or even if you go to University, as you will learn what you need to learn.

So, I would suggest the only way of engaging college students in learning is by exposure to others with that same spark.

Mar 27 2013:
I think we can best engage college students in learning, by having teachers, alumni and parents sharing their passion for learning. You need to get this fire in your belly to go out and learn about the world, about the universe - anything you need to learn. It must be a life-long passion, not something you do for four years and then you move on to the next phase of your life - maybe a job. If you have that passion, then it almost doesn't matter what school you go to. Sorry, expensive private schools...

Mar 21 2013:
The idea of engaging people with learning should have sparked initially from childhood education. I believe it is a bottoms up type of situation where changing the foundation will definitely perpetuate into adulthood.

Peak interests by making learning fun and realistic. Education needs to be easily related to the specific age range and demographics of the students.

The government, or whoever, needs to do more research and actually apply their findings to the educational institutions. We need to break away from factory made children and move into individual growth focused education.

Mar 21 2013:
Take away the incentives for achieving high grades. A test score of 97% is not an indication of learning or proficiency. It is an indication of memorization. (in general)

Better yet - Take away grades. Learning is not a competition. And in my opinion, grades reflect poorly on talent. How can a person learn when there is the higher priority of a passing grade?

Reward based on accomplishment. In the academic world, success seems to be measured by 3 hours exams (or similar). In the rest of the world - the "Real World" - success is measured by achievement of objectives. The time frame of these is weeks, months, or years.

Do not give lectures and do not require students to read textbooks. Provide students with a challenge, provide them with access to a list of resources, and expect delivery. Who is motivated to read a textbook because they were ordered to? But would you be motivated to seek out and read a textbook on Thermodynamics if it was your mission to design and build a heatsink? Or a textbook on Computer Programming if you had to write a program?

You cannot force someone to learn. The current model of university tries to. It fails.

As a student, since my first year i discovered something. Acing exams was impossible UNLESS i start to LEARN and UNDERSTAND. The highschool type of studying was not working anymore, I had many chapters to study in a week or so. So I started to look for other ways to gain this knowledge. And here i became engaged in education and it stopped being a matter of acing the exam. When I LIVED what I am learning, seriously things started to be much easier.

But it was not all me, it was my biology 101 professor who ignited that in us with his excellent way of conveying science. Almost all professors are highly intellectual, smart people, however, few the ones who are good at teaching.

So as an answer to your question i would suggest:
- Make exams and assignments impossible for those who just cram to pass and make it easy for those who are familiar with the material. This can happen by including analysis questions, general understanding questions from documentaries and movies... etc.
- Find professors who are good at teaching, and not only with great researches and achievements.
- Make students feel that their knowledge is useful. Allow internships, organize fairs....etc. And create a culture in the university that values any effort the student makes towards their understanding of their courses.

Mar 17 2013:
Learning needs to be a two-way process. Find out what your students are attracted to, and incorporate that into your teaching. Let everyone in the room share their experience. Align your examples with the areas of interest. Show them how what they are learning is related to their goals. Syllabuses are boring, improvise!

Mar 17 2013:
Teach children to question everything and everyone. Teach them that justice is at the heart of all truth and understanding. Teach them comparison thinking in everything and, teach them how everything and everyone are connected. Teach them its not just what you do say, but just as much about what you don't say.

Mar 17 2013:
I've read a number of the posts here, and I'd like to give my two cents.

As a student:
My job is to get good grades, in order to get scholarships for the next year, in order to get money, in order to get a degree, in order to get a job, in order to get money. It starts at good grades.
Everyone has their own opinion on grades. Some people consider them harmful to learning, others essential. In my experience, it depends wholly on the teacher. "Get a good grade" can translate to a lot of things. It could mean "demonstrate the material", or "repeat after me", or "participate in class", or "think on your own".
Different base purposes lead to different results, but more so than that, different ways of executing those base purposes lead to positive or negative results. In short, it's not the format of the class, it's how the format is used.

As a teacher:
I need to make sure my students get a good balance of "what is needed to pass the test" and "what is needed to actually do something".
I've been teaching martial arts for four years now. There is a significant divide between knowing the katas and using the martial art. Students need to know the kata to pass the test. Practical application is often implied, but rarely tested. Knowing the kata trains students in the proper technique, without which they would hurt themselves using the art. Using the art though, is why you learn the katas in the first place.
I think the important lesson to take from this is that the majority of students will learn what you test them on, but not much farther.

We then return to the original topic. The test format parallels the martial arts tests. Students want a degree (or their next belt). They will learn whatever is required of them to do so, but not any farther. To go farther requires a different mentality, or a different way of teaching. The teaching is part format, part execution. Set a goal that relates to further learning, then execute it in a way that encourages further learning.

Mar 13 2013:
I'm an engaged and idealistic learner who entered college incredibly scornful of students who only wanted a degree and had no love of learning, only to realize I was painfully ignorant of the socioeconomic factors involved. My ideals of learning for the sake of learning came from a place of extreme privilege, and I found that by and large the students who simply sought a degree were those who didn't have the luxury of thinking differently.

I think there are some important curricular shifts that need to happen in order to address this issue. Both courses of practicality and courses of passion need to be requirements in a four-year degree, so that schools aren't divided between liberal arts students with no concrete career goals and preprofessional students who aren't being inspired in class. I think there's a lot that structural reform can do to encourage risk-free exploration.

Mar 14 2013:
I get what you are saying but I think it comes down less to SES (socio economic status) and more to the individual. I came from a lower SES (my families expected contribution based on my FAFSA was 0), but I still wanted to learn to improve myself. This is based on how I was raised. I know that a lot of factors can drive this sort of thing (SES, culture, etc.), but I think its less about privilege and more about values (which aren't always tied to SES).

Mar 18 2013:
Eugene, thank you for making this point. You're absolutely right. I certainly didn't mean to imply that I thought all college students without privileged backgrounds were uninterested in learning for the sake of learning. It was just my realization that a utilitarian approach, when present, was often fueled by factors beyond the student's control.

Apr 10 2013:
Another thing students must understand is that teachers are doing a job. They are trying to build up their credentials so they can get the next big promotion. How students "feel" about the teacher is not high on the list of criteria for promotion. The teacher has to write and get published, has to show initiative, leadership, personal excellence. Teachers are not there to pander to the needs of every slow or lazy student. Kids have to be self motivated and self directed to learn.

Apr 10 2013:
Curiosity is the difference between actively learning and passively acquiring knowledge. We need teachers that arouse the students interest in specific fields; teachers that engage students to be curious and self-motivated to seek out their own information. A teacher who inspires a student to search and explore for information on their own, in my opinion, is of greater value than the many teachers of today who simply deliver knowledge and information.

Apr 9 2013:
Have interesting teachers who can engage the students. I am in school right now and I have changed my major several times because I did not like how I was feeling about school. I found myself in an anatomy class and it was there that I found my desire to learn. My professor was engaging, modern, smart, funny, and he didn't read from powerpoints. He was passionate about what he taught and it showed. If we had more professors like that then students may begin to care about learning again. However, college is a means to an end, and most students are not going to school to learn about something that they care about..they are going to school for something that is relatively uninteresting to them in order to get a job. A lot of the interesting degree choices yield very few prospects for jobs though.

Apr 9 2013:
I also am a college student and I'm in love with learning. As far as my colleagues are concerned I see they miss the big picture of learning. Parents and culture are also stressing financial security over following passion and learning as far as I see it. But above all these I find Galileo's quote absolutely relevant to this subject: "We cannot teach people anything; we can only help them discover it within themselves." Once a student discovers the joy of learning in himself no matter how old-school the teacher is, he will learn from him whatever he has to share in terms of passion and knowledge. It will have a healthy disregard for the formal education system in order to make learning a particular subject worthwhile. Of all the teachers I had, the only ones I clearly remember are the ones that made me discover something within myself, that I continued following to this day.

Apr 8 2013:
Education in our day and time has a distorted meaning to what it actually is. People who study and research things that they are passionate about do it out of curiosity and are driven by finding the answers, while degrees and careers are driven by working and earning a living. To be able to get a job, we require a skill, and thats where what why we choose to study further most of the time, thought we also find when we are studying that there are people who continue studying most of their lives where money plays less of a role than the satisfaction they get from finding answers to their questions!

I feel that it is some kind of a culture, since companies mostly use degrees as a yardstick for hiring a person so that they certainly have the skills to do the job, yet during interviews, we find that outstanding companies tend to find people with the skills as well as the passion that they require for future development and long term goals!

Apr 8 2013:
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Apr 3 2013:
Since I am a student and have found flaws in the way I have been learning I have found their is an absence of accountability. On students and professors parts, I want and need to be challenged so I know I can do these things at a job and professors must want to teach and have a passion for the subject. The use of the internet has even though added a great addition to learning it has made finding information easier therefore s student doesnt have to rely on themself to know or understand something.

Mar 31 2013:
I think it's more of a cultural thing... I'm a first generation student and my initial reasoning for getting into college was based on bettering my life (money/success). That's just what you did to have a better life...

As for how to engage the process of learning, I'd have to agree with Mark on this. Some of the classes I learned the most in were taught by professors with the highest expectations. Each professor tailored their class to test for understanding, not memorization and regurgitation.

Mar 30 2013:
I find it interesting how many answers interpret the word "learning" in a very specific way, as method and not as objective. Your cue, which opposes learning to "getting a degree" leaves me with the interpretation of learning as "knowledge for its own sake", or more to the point; "knowledge which enhances ones quality of life in ways that are not directly marketable."

I see the essence of your question as: "how do we convince students that 'non-directly-marketable knowledge' has its own self-defining value?" .

I think our culture is so currently so wrapped up in "education as survival skill," that the idea of paying money to gain knowledge which is not immediately weighted by its ability to return a visible, quantifiable profit (by your implied definition) lies, essentially, outside of the awareness of most current academic settings, public forums, political agendas, and, finally, and most telling for our collective future; candidates for, and graduates of, higher education. May you find success in your efforts.

Mar 29 2013:
Make it hard to succeed. Really hard. Design your course so that students are pushed to the very limit of what they're capable of. When I know I'm only going to have 3 hours to write a 4 hour exam I'm forced to go beyond simple memorization and regurgitation; I need to know the material inside and out. When I walk out of that final I couldn't care less about the grade; all I feel is a profound sense of accomplishment. I have a few professors who challenge me this way. I have no idea what they get paid but I can say with confidence that whatever it is it isn't enough.

My university is a cash cow for the government. It markets heavily to international students (who pay 3x tuition) and pumps out degrees. Academic misconduct is widely tolerated and many students are handed credentials they do not earn. By raising the bar you help people like me by preventing my degree from being watered down. When an employer sees Bachelor of Business Administration on my resume I want him to think of 'Rocky Balboa' and not 'Bill and Ted'.

I can't help but wonder how many of my resumes will be cast aside because the person I'm hoping to replace came from my school.

Mar 23 2013:
If getting a job is the primary driver, it is questionable that you can engage most college students in learning itself as a primary priority. Most entry-level jobs require at least a bachelor's degree. Many mid-level jobs require a masters. The focus is on the paper or the letters after your name; not the knowledge. My experience [in human capital businesses and as a business owner and now human capital consultant] indicates:

1. the degree provides a quick & dirty way to assess assumed knowledge and ability to learn. It is a false assumption. A degree indicates that an individual sat through a series of required classes, absorbed at least the minimum information required to pass tests required to graduate. Much of this experience is unrelated to the skills required to perform well in most industries - profit or non-profit, public or private. There are many people with advanced degrees who can talk about their area of expertise, but have no idea how to actually product results. There is also very little if any emphasis on the communication skills and emotional intelligence needed to move ahead in almost any job.

2. To actually assess knowledge - and very importantly, ability to continuously learn and adapt - would require time, knowledge and ability that is absent in most organizations. It's easier to slap a 'must have' requirement on the job posting, even if a large percentage of people with that degree are not a good fit, don't produce expected outcomes, and either wash-out or are accommodated indefinitely as under-performers.

3. Most assessment processes do not adequately predict ability and willingness to do the job, perform well as part of a team to produce results, nor even minimal skills needed to be functional.
Bottom line, sad to say: Most students are smart enough to understand the rules of the game and need a job to pay off their student debt.

Mar 21 2013:
hmm. I can think of several ways which are more foundational. Changing the culture of learning or Instill the love of learning at a younger age. Encourage learning for life skills etc.

However, I see the main challenge you are addressing is the reason the students are at college. They are there for the degree to get a job. The students that are attending the college NOT for a job and instead are there to actually learn will not need to be addressed in a new manner. They already want to learn.

So for those that want the degree and that is all they care about.... How about getting several high level executives from local companies to visit and give them this speech. "Ladies and gentleman, our company requires a 4 year degree. But that just gets your name on the list as a candidate. We will very quickly weed out the individuals that have not really learned this material."

From my talks with hiring managers, that is the approach they take.....hmm. perhaps not the best solution. But it might get them to actually take learning seriously

Mar 21 2013:
In a world going faster and faster, i think it will be an effective idea for the majority of universities around the wold to get involved in the online education why classes in colleges study courses from big universities like MIT or Harvard to their students.
i think it will make a big jump in the educational process in the developing countries in Africa of Asia.

Mar 21 2013:
focus on teaching them techniques, and not on random general knowledge, combine this with work as apprentice ships, the main need of any student is money and not knowledge, if the knowledge produces or guaranties money, then every one is happy!,it sounds simple, and it is. the second priority is ethics as no one likes abusers

Mar 21 2013:
Please don't think that college students haven't learnt anything before they come to your college to get a degree. Most of them have learnt that they need an earning and getting a college degree increases the chance of getting a paying job. We have devised an utilitarian society where being rich and resourceful equates success in life so there is no point blaming our youth having lesser concern for learning in academic sense of meaning.
We have systematically dissociated academic inspiration of learning from our education system. In India, Education is simply a career option. If you are a mainstream teacher possibly you are teaching for a pay, your University must be having a placement office catering to job market. Education system of this type is an economic enterprise and the incentive is clearly fiscal. To try to get the young minds inspired to learn for pure academic fulfilment in this system is like trying to pull a cart sitting on it.
We look at brilliant and genious minds of our society with awe because we feel deep inside that the system sucks and these gifted people are exceptions not rules.

Mar 21 2013:
Intelligence does matter but as long as it can be applied to make 'profit' not a life changing value set. Real learning is not concerned with money but how you see its dispensing value, among other things.
I would like Ethics, Morality and Philosophy be part of academic syllabii right from junior school and Institutions will laugh at me.

Mar 21 2013:
I think the earlier the better. I don't think it could hurt to introduce them new ideas, unless study shows that children at the ages of 7 learning Ethics, Morality, and Philosophy will explode....ha.

Mar 21 2013:
Sure. I tried it with my son when he was 4 years old. I would take a Cadbury chocolate to him amd say: you can eat it and have all the fun but you can share it with a friend and have fun together. He ate the chocolate all by himself first time. From next day on, he would give half to his cousin and ask: did you enjoy it?

Mar 21 2013:
You should really be honest and tell the full story. First we should name the characters to make this fable easier to follow. We will label your son as Al and his cousin as Chad.

If we back the story up to the previous day we find out that Chad already has in his possession one-half of a Cadbury chocolate bar. Chad leverages his Cadbury to barter self-indulgent pleasures such as a footlong Subway sandwhich, a 20 oz. Coke, two cigarettes, and a Redbox movie rental. Chad wakes up the next morning and starts throwing a temper tantrum after coming to the realization that he has no more chocolate. The conniving little cousin quickly calls his Aunt, your wife, to make sure others feel pitty for the kid who has to live without chocolate. Your wife pulls Al aside and guilts him to feel like he is a capitalistic pig for hoarding chocolate even though Al busted his backside for the past two weeks doing chores around the house to win favor with his mother.

Al reaches out to his cuz Chad, semi-reluctantly giving him one-half of his hard earned chocolate bar. Al's dad applaudes the move and feels the jesture is just since Al has more chocolate than the average kid in his neighborhood. Chad mean while snatches the gifted chocolate bar, stomps out of the room where he and Al were conversing while complaining that Al should be donating even more just before slamming the door in anger.

Mar 19 2013:
Ignite the students passion for learning. Test the fundamentals, but inspire every student to create or participate in projects that will reinforce the fundamentals while expanding knowledge, skills, wonder and awe. If your classroom is not like kids happily playing in the park, try to make it more so. My passion for learning was not truly ignited until I was doing my Master's degree in Special Education, when the professor asked, "is this project going to be something you will use in your own classroom? No? Then, why are you doing it? Pick a project meaningful to you." Wow, I realized. School is supposed to be about learning that is meaningful to me? Fasten your seatbelt, Frank, we're kicking in the afterburners.

Mar 19 2013:
As a medical student I have felt the exact same way! I have been inspired to go into medicine by a single class of high school biology... Ever since I've been more passionate about medicine than anything else in life :) but now as a medical student I find myself more interested in the subjects in which my teachers are enthusiastic and interested themselves!

Mar 18 2013:
Well, as a current student, I can honestly say that it really just depends on active engagement. Then again, that's just for people like me. That could mean getting them involved in extracurricular activities (things like student newspaper, student government or number of other things). Honestly, being actively involved as an undergrad is what kept me from dropping out. Though after getting into grad school, I started caring more about the learning after being told "You have a lot of great ideas. We're going to help you organize them into something shareable." If I had someone saying that during the pre-grad school part of my education, I probably would've been engaged and actually cared about my education pre-grad school.

Mar 17 2013:
Every year of college should include at least of 3 months of practical experience (related to field of study); minimum-wage should be paid to student by concern where he is working to ensure this period is taken seriously by all stake holders.

This way both Academicians and Industry / Employers are linked.

Practical experience would give a chance to student to apply theory and stimulate his imagination.

Mar 17 2013:
YES!!! I'm a little crazy about this question because I'm still stuck in the middle of it so I admit that is a bias. IMHO I think the problem in general is that school gets in the way of learning instead of facilitating it. There are three suggestions I have.

1. Adopt technology. Its just the way we think and work and it will facilitate everything else we need to do.

2. Allow more flexibility. Yes there are a lot of interesting things in the world but I only have so much time and so maybe I want to spend more time learning about genetics and a lot less thinking about something someone else thinks is a worthy subject. If you do this people will be more interested because they can tailor their individual major and it would be even better to be able to tailor individual classes.

3. Focus on skills. In the end the biggest thing I want from college is the ability to actually do something. Sometimes I wonder if I would have been better off if I could have just gotten an internship or apprenticeship that would have actually taught me an actual skill. Even complicated things can picked up in this manner. The most useful experience I had was volunteering in a research lab.

I'm not sure about the details but I do know that I feel like college sucks the excitement out of learning, even subjects that I love. This needs to change and I'm willing to make a big push for this.

Mar 17 2013:
School is work, everyone forgets that for most kids learning is stressful because they are not in the highest intelligence bracket. Very smart people forget what comes easy, naturally and is fun/stimulating to them, is painful and stressful to most other human beings.

Learning = work = stress to most people to whom must spend more time and energy to learn and because its painful it's not very fun.

Mar 14 2013:
it depends on teacher that how well he is able to present ideas in class. I had an experience to teach college students .As long as I was using conventioanl methods of teaching they were not showing much interest.Then I switched to multimedia and movies , showed them real life examples. Occasionaly i took 5 to 10 minutes of the lecture time to talk something , i thought, they might like to hear (motivational stories, or interesting facts).

Making teaching experience more creative can help to some extent but for an effective solution, Yes! paradigm shift is must.

Mar 13 2013:
Eugene, You are starting way to high. This must start at the lowest of grades to be effective. Yes there must be a shift in education. The problems are many: 1) The power in education are the textbook publishers and test writers. 2) interference from state and federal intervention 3) high stakes testing 4) feather bedding by educational administrators 5) and so forth.

You have to ask some basic questions: why would a professor of law teach at 80 K and complain when he could use that knowledge to amass millions? How can a school of business go bankrupt? Why are Nobel professors are hired to do research and make money for the school and not to teach? Once you stand back and take all of this in you will find that schools are not there to educate you ... they are a business that are very poorly run. States provide billions a year, students pay through the nose, research grants from corporations, grants through the government, donations, BIG money for TV contracts to broadcast their games, and on and on ... yet every year they are ... again broke. So what happens they become a diploma mills to lure in more students to recieve more money and the cycle continues. The beast is in survival mode ... we reward these administrators like politicians .. for their failures. When all of this stops and the onus become the education of the strudents not feeding the beast then you will have your answer.

I support a competent / non-competent system where you do not recieve a grade but demonstrate your competency to progress to the next module until you complete all modules arriving at a goal. This allows self paced learning while associating with your peers to enhance social development. It does not ask you to regurgate, selct multiple guess, or compete in high stakes testing but demands you show a application of the subject/information.

Society demands the sheep skin. It does not mean you know anything. Been there seen that at GD Fort Worth.

Mar 14 2013:
If I was to take step one .... I would divide high school circulums into 1) college prep and 2) manual trades and arts. I would follow that with the competent / non-competent as stated above.

The problem is that we have continued to grow government and until we return to a Constitutional Government we are at a loss to do anything constructive in many areas including education.

The quickest means would involve the military and industrial complex to only hire the competent and to make a statement to the educational system that they will not accept the product that is currently being turned out. This would have immediate consequences and set change in motion.

The system accepts no responsibility for their product. Perhaps holding their feet to the fire would also demonstrate the need for a return to excellence.

Anything is good ... a journey of a thousand miles begins with the first step.

Mar 13 2013:
This is a very complex question that has plagued the university system since universities began.
My answer here is that it is up to the student to decide what he or she is going to get out of the system. It is not up to the system to provide anything on a silver platter.
The last time I was in a bricks and mortar university was 1976 at Western.
It has 4 professional schools (Meds, Dents, Business and Law) making up the 4 horsemen of the apocalypse. If you were aiming for one of these then what ever you were learning on the path was of no consequence. You would sabotage anyone to get a better mark.
If you were in PolySci you were here because you were going to run the world and whatever you were learning was really beneath you but part of the process.
Then there were the girls (don't beat me up for this, it WAS 1976 after all) who were at the U to snag a husband. You could tell who they were because they dressed up for supper in residence like it was a cotillion and the big parade was going to get icecream at the end of dinner. It would take an hour for the walk up and back. (Really....you had to see it).
The university then as they all are now, is a research and publishing machine. Teaching is an unavoidable side effect and part of the funding process that the administration has never figured out how to drop.
There were however, exceptional professors who overcame all that to reach the students who were there to learn about a topic. They knew your name, what you did in class and what you did out of class. If you were really interested in a topic, class work would just scratch the surface. You had to use your time at university to dig in using all the resource you could scrounge.
Those students are the ones you can reach. Most of the others are just passing through your area of expertise but hopefully they have snagged onto are area they are really interested in and they will dive in.

Mar 12 2013:
I'd love to blame the students, but I think the onus falls on the professors. When i was at uni I didn't care about learning too much, but the right teachers got me interested in the subject and working to learn more. With the right direction and well chosen assignments a students attitude can shift completely. But if the professor is going to give stale lectures and mindless assignments so that they're doing just enough to get their pay packet, then the students will pick up on that and do just enough to get their degree.
Otherwise, I think the timing of university is wrong. I study more now than I ever did at uni. 15 years later and I am more of a student than a teacher. When you're 18 -22 you only focus on socialising, meeting girls and having fun, exploring the world and enjoying life. We should encourage people to work and travel for 2 or 3 years before going to university when they might actually want to learn.

3.Let students harness the aid of 3d modeling softwares for better understanding.

4.Let students play with 3-D models of everything they learn,let them manipulate the world around them by this they will absorb concepts much better and leads to greater retention.

5.Last but not the least give least importance to exams in a students life bcoz only then he/she will focus on learning and absorbing a concept and applying it in real life rather than studying for exams and forget it after that.

Apr 10 2013:
One of the biggest problems I see with university studies in particular is that they are dissociated from what the job market values in terms of skills. Most jobs require a fairly high level of technical skills, and yet most High School graduates lack even the most basic skills to be considered for an entry level job. Universities have traditionally managed to bridge that gap, but as technological changes have accelerated, even Universities are finding that they are ill prepared to deal with the rapid developments and changes.

I live and breathe IT across a pretty broad spectrum - everything from servers and networks to low level users and even disabled people. The one common thing I see, time and time again, is how - even 20 years into the "information age", workers are still unable to deal with even the most basic technology issues. The really scary thing is that it includes relatively young users as well - often recent college graduates.

In my narrow world view, we shouldn't allow a single college degree unless they could demonstrate some competence in basic computing skills and typing. At this point every person should have some training in being able to tell what spam and malware looks like. Instead, we (taxpayers) spend inordinate amounts of our dollars and teacher's time in classes on art, photography (anyone still developing film? LOL!), cooking, and sports. We truly have a nation of amateur athletes that don't know how to turn on an All-In-One computer or know NOT to click on every single link in their emails.

Get a curriculum that is based on industry needs, and which directly leads to competitive jobs and internships with leaders in our various industries. Hold a carrot up in front of our freshmen: "Learn this and earn a real career with unlimited potential", instead of "show up and get a certificate for your wall". Instead of mandatory intro courses on how to find food on campus, perhaps a job-fair or two?

Apr 10 2013:
We must first alter our typical education program in the grade levels. Curiosity is squandered by today's formal education, all schools look for are results, so who cares about the arts and broadening ideas in science or research, if the standardized test scores aren't up to par the school isn't successful. How can we hope for us college students to have a drive for curiosity and research when we're being taught that all we need to focus on is getting the grade and that we need to learn how to crunch numbers and fill in bubbles. We're being brought up to live a corporate lifestyle in which everything is standard. you answer phones fill out paper work, and go home. Colleges offer so much for us students but we follow such a common path of schooling that we take whats required we don't expand our horizons because we're taught not too. I'm in college now, I'm in my third year at a community college, now many people will tell me that i must be doing poorly because i should have transferred out by now and that i'm behind, but I'm one of the few who got through the sieve, I look through the courses offered and take just about anything that interests me on top of what is required for my degree. Yes it will take me a bit longer to get my degree, and yes some say its a waste of money, but to me its the ability to become more well rounded and to actually learn new things that are out there. I'm pursuing a degree to be a Elementary and Special Education teacher, but in the mean time I'm taking other things that interest me and as working with kids already i feel like learning and being curious with my own studies will only help me become a better teacher, and hopefully when it comes my time to guide a class of young curious minds, I will be able to help them pursue and strengthen their own curiosity. to encourage today's college students to learn rather than just rush for a degree we need to change their early education and stop ruining our drive and love of pursuing knowledge

Apr 10 2013:
When I started back to college @ 38 yo, I was interested in metallurgy and welding, after completing a one year program I moved on to an associate of applied science. Along the way I picked up an associate of liberal arts. When I moved to a four year university I designed my own program through University studies. I took writing classes, communication and journalism, fine art, and English. What surprised me was what I didn't know but needed to before I started into any new course of study.

I think all schools need to take student feedback more seriously. Students need to be prepared for the rigors of college from K-12. I read a lot of student papers which demonstrated very poor grammar and poor organization skills. Colleges have to provide more of an educational "experience" if they want students to have a zest for learning. It's also a good idea to point out that knowing a little about a lot of fields helps you navigate in society. Where learning everything you can about one field will help you earn a living. Both are necessary.

Apr 10 2013:
I certainly agree with Matt. In the past, college was just a place for me to go get a degree. Now that I've served in the Marine Corps and had those years to become more mature, I definitely see college as a place to go learn and become more educated about everything. Instead of just oh yeah I need to go to college for a degree or else I wont go anywhere in life.

Apr 9 2013:
As a recent college graduate, I can attest that I have been more motivated to learn after graduation. I think that if college were delayed, and students were given a few years to mature after high school, and to enter the workforce, college would be seen as a better opportunity to learn rather than a place to get away from home.

Apr 9 2013:
We learn from the best teachers. They need to make things interesting and guide students. If you tell me that I must learn these 5 chapters for a test on Friday then I will cram them in order to pass. But if every day you show students the relevance and importance of what it is that they are being taught, in everyday life then they are most likely to learn and remember it for a long time, and from that they can create with the knowledge they have.

ps. this is a good topic; I remember very little from my degree that I acquired 7yrs ago...

Apr 9 2013:
Today's talk by Dr. Hrabowski really pointed out a lot of these issues. The main problem is something that he discussed at the end of his talk. College/university courses aren't very well designed and structured. They're presented by tenured professors who are out of touch with the current generation or the industries that their students want to get into. Many of them are not good presenters or teachers, and see the classes they teach as a distraction from research. A lot of the coursework is busy work. Tests really aren't very effective. Many of the course I took in university didn't stimulate learning and academics and didn't prepare me for a career. Which makes them useless in very real sense. People spend money on a college education so that they can get a job afterwards, they don't do it to learn because its not a great place to learn. When I really want to know something I go to the internet. You can't just trust everything on the internet, then again, your professors opinion isn't always right.

Apr 8 2013:
Well for that I think you would need to convince them that the knowledge they get will actually help them become better at what they do.

If you look at industry where students want to learn more and the discipline itself is more important than the grades, such as Visual arts and Design, you realize that the passion students must develop for these things stems from the facts that they are doing something creative and in the industry they will have to keep creating things and coming up with new stuff...

So to achieve the same results in sciences you have to adapt the same approach, instead of having students recite formulas for no apparent reason, they will be introduced to the complex problems of our world, to the applications of sciences and how the students can help influence developments and make patents they can sell for money. (Disgustingly sad but in our current society that is the carrot at the end of that stick)

Also means that instead of relaying on grades and scores to get a job and secure income there will be actual encouragement of independent study and research and teachers will want to wad through a slushpile of ill composed essays about how this or that can work using what they learned. .

Presenting students with examples of how the knowledge they gain can be applied or is important is crucial at every step of the way so they can be inspired to learn more and come up with their own stuff.
Showing them TED lectures might help.

The problem with this approach is that usually there are Students who are not interested in some schools of knowledge so they tend to disrupt studies for everyone by acting difficult..

Apr 7 2013:
I believe we should look back to the greeks. they had the word "skole", meaning leisure, which later would become "school" in english. leisure meant not simply relaxing recreation, but kind of making search of knowledge and wisdom your lifestyle. finding joy and feeling like you belong just as any other activity we do, but by learning through discussion, practical experimenting and drawing experience from others.

for this to happen money wod have to seize being boss. seeing as few of the sciences and researches that are important and urgent are not profitable..

Apr 2 2013:
The Curricular in these colleges also needs adjustments. You will agree that they are very bulky, centered only on those students who can quickly 'gun' material, rather than learn it. I think the problem starts from childhood. The whole learning environment has to be centered on learning, shaping our minds to question stuff. Then we may be ready to do it with the mental attitude required.

Apr 1 2013:
It is the way our society works. We are supposed to get a good university degree which would open doors for jobs in good companies and resulting in a life-long job (and secured life).

Companies / Govts are offering jobs to people who have degrees from reputed colleges. They do not want people who are lifelong learners. How can we expect students to be lifelong learners in such conditions.

Funny fact is - Companies say they do not get skilled people (ready to delivery value - for salary paid - from day one).

Mar 31 2013:
Get them to contribute to the body of knowledge rather than just regurgitate it. Every class should have soem means of enabling students studying the subject to make a contribution. The contribution does not have to be much, like a perspective, and example problem, and application, a concept or thought, but there should be some way to collect and archive some of the thoughts of the thinkers in your classroom.

This might be the difference between and means to an end and a personal association with the subject material. Often, once you make a contribution, it is infectious, and you want to continue. That is the desire and passion you need to capture.

Mar 29 2013:
Ditch the lecture style and incorporate different learning styles into it. For example role plays, field trips, experiments and laboratories for the kinaesthetic learners, handouts, booklets, written material for the reader/writer learners, video clips, visual aids, powerpoints for the visual learners, and audio and video clips, and discussions for the audio learners. Also, adult learners are more engaged in their learning when they feel a part of the learning. Having group discussions, debating different theories, mock trials, and encouraging learners to share their knowledge and experiences in the context of learning. Works wonders. I am a trainer, and I have also lectured at University. I have many people approach me after the trainings where I have incorporated all of the above, to tell me how much fun they had, how passionate they are now about the subject, and how much they are looking forward to using what they have learnt out in the world. It seriously works!

Mar 27 2013:
I think the best way to get us students to learn is to be really engaging with students. Most of the lectures are delivered one-way, not encouraging students to share their opinions on topics being discussed. The most chance students have to say anything is during exams, by which time they barely have any in-depth understanding of what they have been taught. Professors should ask questions, get students to make talking-points, encourage group discussions, and the culture that 'no answer is a bad answer'. I think that students are willing to learn, it is only that the style of teaching now does not really emphasize learning, just studying.

Mar 27 2013:
I wish this was after my first comment, where it belongs.
By the way, over the years I have been employed as a teacher in private schools whose students were accredited by the respective states and countries where I taught. I have edited a newspaper and worked as a salaried copy writer for magazines. I functioned as a salaried researcher in applied science, as the data processing manager for an auto parts wholesaler, managed a branch for that wholesale business, and never once was asked about my educational background. I was generally hired away from my current employer by one of his associates or friends who became aware of my job performance.

Drive, your own thirst for knowledge, and your personal desire to improve yourself and anything you touch will hold you in good stead with whatever endeavor you have decided to pursue. Formal education will open many doors for you, but personal excellence cannot be overestimated.

I have a young acquaintance without a high school diploma or even a GED who landed a job during the height of unemployment as dishwasher in a newly opened restaurant. After a year he is being groomed as a cook and assistant manager. The owner has even spoken of opening a new branch with him in charge. Hard work, dedication, and loyalty still go a long way toward personal success.

Mar 27 2013:
The raison d'etre and modus operandi of colleges mitigate against a desire to learn. These institutions are designed to deliver a series of studies some other person has decided should be of interest to a student and the mastery of these subjects is but a step toward a goal of employment that a student needs.

Furthermore, these studies proceed at a pace that may not even closely approximate the learning abilities of the student. Today that student has far more efficient, specialized, and relevant means to acquire whatever knowledge that captures his interests or needs.

We must differentiate between "formal" learning and practical individualized education. Everyone is learning in every moment of their waking, and sometimes even their sleeping, hours. Much of that learning is incidental to their everyday environment, but they are also acquiring knowledge that satisfies their curiosity and the incidental encounters that spark their interest. Look at how rapidly students learn the skills, niceties, and accepted language distortions of texting and tweeting, for example.

Unfortunately, with the explosion of information and the burgeoning of tools that replace once required learned techniques much of formal education has become irrelevant.

Software can design a building to my liking and guarantee it will meet all physical constraints required as it complies with all codes. Word processors can guarantee correct spelling and acceptable grammar in what I write. Calculators can apply geometric, algebraic, and calculus operations without my needing to know how those things are done. Google can translate articles written in any foreign language. Even my cell phone can translate conversations I may have with others who do not speak my language. Formal education need to be modernized to the world in which it operates. Otherwise it is just a ticket an antiquated system forces one to buy to get many jobs in the work place.

Mar 26 2013:
To get students to really learn, I think the university curriculum should be revised to include a session where students meet as a class or group to discuss issues affecting our nations and the world at large and how to fix them. We get students thinking on their feet in helping resolve these problems. They can use such group/class discussions as a platform to assist governmental policies that would eventually better the lives of the populace. With such platforms, students can be made to share ideas which they think might impact the world in the long run and I believe, they would have learnt a lot even before leaving school

Mar 26 2013:
I think their should be more company sponsorship deals to help young people get into the workplace earlier than the norm. It is important for young adults to enter the world of work early. In Germany there is a system whereby young adults enter work on internships, once these are completed they have the choice to go to college or university or are offered a job at the company they work for. Work provides a great foundation before obtaining a degree or starting out on a career.

Mar 25 2013:
Encourage "flow" :
Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi: Flow, the secret to happiness :http://www.ted.com/talks/mihaly_csikszentmihalyi_on_flow.html
And Intrinsic motivation.
Dan Pink: The puzzle of motivation:http://www.ted.com/talks/dan_pink_on_motivation.html
To deal with the finance bit, just teach them happiness can (and should) be a mean rather than an end. Show them statical data that money doesn't (necessarily) correlate with happiness.
And accept all different types of intelligence, and skills and don't neglect any of them. Also have knowledge of a "self-fulfilling prophecy", and encourage self-control/ will-power. And teach students that making mistakes doesn't mean your a failure, and lets schools be more accepting for introverts and extroverts alike.
While your at it, try and make education personalized a little bit.
It's as simple as that.
Hope this helps :)

Mar 25 2013:
Simply by not making a college degree the pre-requisite for job selection. The company hiring people should appoint talented and practical recruitment managers, who have a deep understanding of the company for which they are recruiting. Like in the good old days :))

It it so happens - utopia - than those who will enter colleges will learn to get true knowledge and wisdom and not learn to earn. I have just kept my answer limited to your question - how best to engage college students to the idea of learning - the above is one such idea. http://www.hikmaah.com/showartcl.asp?article=13